A Learning Experience

Our daughter will be 3 in April and lately we've been discussing ways to teach her the value of money. We want her to realize food, toys, and basically everything we have, gets paid for with hard earned and saved money. We've come up with several ideas, but one that seemed to work quite well for her was actually giving her a dollar and having her spend it.

I went with my sister-in-law to a craft store and gave Victoria a dollar (4 quarters) and told her she could spend it any way she wanted to. She was beyond excited and it didn't take long for her to decide she wanted a container to hold her treasure box coins.

We searched and searched until she felt like she found the perfect container (a little more than a dollar. I didn't mind helping out a little, especially since it was so cute!). When we got to the check-out and I told her to put her dollar on the counter to pay for her container she started crying. She told me the dollar was hers and she wanted to keep it. Which was great because then we got to talk about how she could either keep the dollar or get the container, she couldn't do both. After a few more tears she finally decided to get the container.

The rest of the day she would ask if we had bought certain things throughout the house. At the dinner table she said, "So... all of those things we get at Ikea we have to pay money for!" (I told you we love Ikea at our house). Long story short - I think she understands more than ever why we don't just go out and buy a new toy when one gets broken.

Her new bed... sort of

On Sunday night our daughter begged to have the sides taken off her crib so she could have a big girl bed. After talking to her about some of the rules of big girl beds (i.e. not joining us in bed in the middle of the night and other such things), we took the sides off. She loves it and has slept through the night without any problems. Yesterday I took her to Ikea to officially make it her 'new' big girl bed by having her pick out some bedding for it. This is what her bed looks like now:



To get a pillow, comforter, pillow case and duvet cover cover it was $36. I thought it was a great deal and luckily she chose something that we can use for a boy too.

Things She Loves

Here are a few of the things we've been enjoying lately:

Making snow castles.

The day before we put food coloring in ice-cube trays and they added a fun touch to our snow castles.

Making new hair bows.

My sister-in-law came over and we made a few different styles and colors. They were surprisingly fast and easy to make. And for whatever reason my daughter actually wants to wear them even though she has never liked hair stuff before.

Ikea toys.

She loves the train set and practically lives in the tent (I'm amazed at everything she can put in there - including the train. I'll have to take a picture when I'm not feeling so lazy!). She also can't get enough of her new stool.

Tis' The Season!

Last year we didn't deliver goodies to family and friends for Christmas. I blamed it on moving halfway across the country a few months prior, but I think it was really just laziness. So I decided this year I had better make up for last year and get something delivered to those nearby family and friends! This is what I came up with:

I absolutely love chocolate covered pretzels and they were surprisingly easy to make. The thing that took the longest was melting the chocolate, but once it was melted it was a quick process.

I had my daughter help out as well. This is how hers turned out (I think we'll just let her eat them!):

Christmas Countdown

We made a paper chain to countdown to Christmas. The days are written on one side of the chain and a fun activity is written on the other side. Like so:

Some of the activities are things we'll do as a family, others are things my daughter and I will do during the day. Some of them are family traditions as well. Here are a few of the things we'll be doing:

December 3rd - decorate tree
" 5th - make gingerbread houses
" 6th - make Christmas placemats
" 12th - sing carols as a family
" 14th - deliver goodies to family/friends
" 17th - buy presents for Daddy
" 19th - family movie night (watch a Christmas movie)
" 20th - go see the lights at Temple Square

What are some of your family traditions and how do you countdown to Christmas?

I'm In Love!

With this:

Today has been a rough day because I've thrown up about 7 times (yes, I'm pregnant). My sister-in-law was kind enough to bring me two grocery sacks of things she thought might help, and Fuze was one of those things. I just have to say, I love it! I have a hard time drinking liquids when I'm pregnant because water and sugar both make me sick. Fuze, however, has enough flavor that it's not water and only 1g of sugar, so it has been a great find for me. Pregnant or not, I think you'll like it!

Decorating Idea

I love doorways. I'm not sure why. Maybe it's because a door is the first thing about a home that you see. Anyway, after I realized we were going to be moving quite a bit I decided that I want a picture of all the front doors of the homes we live in. Whether it's one home or ten I think it makes for a great decorating idea.

Here are two of my favorites (the same door) from all our moving!